Eat: Part 2.

If you know me well you know that when I get into something I am all in. I rarely "dabble" in things. If I decide I'm gonna do something, I'm all in. This is what got me into the breast feeding predicament I talked about it my last blog. For example, for a short while I was an extreme couponer. The phase lasted less than a year, but during that time I spent a ton of time obsessing over printing coupons, reading coupon blogs, sorting coupons, stockpiling, etc. Back when I was a PP (pregnant pinterest-er), I was obsessed with organizing my boards in a way that would help me be a first time mom (unfortunately it was a lot of time misspent, since I don't really use them, but it kept me busy during those long 38 weeks).

It's this kind of obsession that sometimes keeps me from starting something because if I can't do something well, I don't like doing it at all. In my time browsing the "kids" section of pinterest, I came upon many pins about making your own baby food. I didn't really want to repin these pins because making your own baby food sounded like one of those things that I could easily become obsessed with, but I doubted that I would have time for. So when it came time to feed John Mark his first solids I decided we would just go with Gerber baby food. This would not only save this working mom a ton of time, but also I could collect their little plastic containers and the teacher in me was very excited about the limitless opportunities these containers provide for storing school goodies!

So John Mark ate pears, prunes, sweet potatoes, apples...Well one day I decided I would give him some bananas. When I peeled back the lid, I was beyond grossed out. This really potent, unnatural smell filled the air. If it smelled that bad, I couldn't imagine how it would taste. I decided right then and there I would at least consider making my own baby food. After some research, I realized how simple it is!

In the spirit of keeping it somewhat easy, I do use frozen fruits and veggies (along with some fresh like banana and avocado). Frozen works for me because I do not have to peel and core and because apparently frozen vegetables and fruits can sometimes be even more nutrient rich than store bought (depending on how long they've been sitting on the produce aisle). This website, wholesomebabyfood.com, really is amazing and explains everything. I don't even use a Baby Bullet or anything fancy. I just steam the veggies in the microwave and use my counter-sized food processor to blend it all up. The only equipment I've bought is ice cube trays for freezing 1 ounce portions. I still use pre-made food sometimes when we go out to eat (because the frozen stuff needs to be refrigerated until eaten....and because I still love to collect those plastic containers, haha!).

John Mark loves his food. He eats one fruit and one veggie two times a day. At daycare they laugh because they can only heat one at a time and he gets mad when he's waiting on his second portion to warm up. His favorites so far are sweet potatoes and pears, but he really loves it all (even the pre-made stuff).

Here's what he's had so far:
prunes
sweet potatoes
apples
pears
banana
avocado
peas
peaches
green beans
baby puffs
Mum Mums
frozen grapes (in a mesh feeder)
oatmeal cereal (FYI this is not necessary as they thought it was back when we were kids...it didn't work well on JM's little tummy, so new moms should know you can totally skip cereal)

Here are some photos of our food journey. It's hard to believe that in less than 5 months he won't be taking a bottle anymore and will be feeding himself full time!

 Turns out the peas don't really need to be strained...that was a disaster...

Just Wait

If I ever When I used to complain about sleeping while pregnant, I'm sure more than one person who already had kids either said to me "just wait" or at least said it in their head. I mentioned in my blog about sleep that I am now one of these people...I just wants to warn all pregnant people or anyone pre-child: sleep while you can! In other words, if you think sleep is difficult now, then...."just wait." Those two words...

I've noticed that along with "time flies" and "they grow too fast," "just wait" is a recurring theme among mommies. For instance, last weekend when my friend, Tami, was lamenting over her current 17 week pregnancy woes, Kellie (new mom to 7 week old baby Nathan) and I exchanged the "just wait" eyes (raised eye brows over wide open eyes). We both looked at her and said, "just wait." Meaning 1) it is going to get so much worse the bigger you get and 2) if you think life is hard now, then...."just wait." (One day, Tami will be making the "oh-I-get-it-eyes.") 

Similarly, if I ever complain about sleep to someone with older children, they can't help but say, "just wait...one day they'll be teenagers out driving on their own and then you really won't be able to sleep." I'm sure that parents of toddlers say something like, "enjoy it while you can, once they start walking things get really hard...just wait." Because they grow so quickly and the changes come so rapidly, there's always something new around the corner.

Even though a lot of times these words are used to hint that something worse is coming, the rapid changes also mean that good is coming. Back during the newborn phase, people used to tell me that each new month would get better. "Just wait til 4 weeks...things get so much easier." "Eight weeks is when things get better." "If you can just wait til 12 weeks, life will change. Just wait." These words really give new moms hope and I know that they're right, but I just have to say that life at 7 months is way better than it ever was back when I was still referring to my baby's age in weeks! I'd say that once he could lay on his play mat and play in his exersaucer (around 4 months), things didn't just get a tiny bit easier, but also a lot more fun. If you're not there yet, just wait.

To all the moms with babies younger than John Mark who are experiencing wonderful things such as first smiles and five hours of sleep in a row, I want to tell them: If you think things are good now, just wait. Just wait til they can really smile at you. Just wait until they giggle with you. Just wait until they splash and play in the bathtub. Just wait until you get to feed them food for the first time and see the look on their face as they experience their first flavors. Just wait until they can roll over and reach for the toys they like. Just wait until they smile up at you from the crib in the morning. Just wait until they squeal with delight when they see you come in the door at daycare.

I am sure moms with babies older than John Mark want to say "just wait" to me too. Just wait until they reach for you. Just wait until they say "momma." Just wait until he can give you a kiss. Just wait until they say, "I love you." I'm sad about him getting older, but there are so many milestones I am excited to see him experience. I.Just.Can't.Wait.

Here he is enjoying a bubble bath:

Here he is in his beloved exersaucer:

One of his first tastes- prunes:

This photo is misleading. Oh how I wish he could hold is own cup/bottle!

Eat: Part 1.

A little disclaimer: when I started this, I really didn't know I'd go on and on about breast feeding for so long. It's still a sore subject since we didn't make it past five months (rather than the year I hoped I could go), but I guess I'm writing down the journey in case someday I want to relive it.  If you're not a mom or soon to be mom, you will probably find this excruciatingly boring and possibly even confusing. Breast feeding is a world of it's own with language and a lifestyle that you can never "get" until you've been there...

From the get-go, what your baby eats is the single most important thing in your day. It rules your life. For.A.Long.Time. Your life literally revolves around when your baby eats. And since pretty much all they do is sleep when they're really young, eating becomes the primary focus of life. I was dead set on breast feeding. We attended a class and I read all about it. Free nourishment for our baby plus a higher IQ? It doesn't get much better than that. We thought.

In the beginning (I thought), things were going great. When John Mark was 2 weeks old, I headed to a breastfeeding support group. I mainly went because I needed to get out of the house and meet some other people who were in my boat. I learned he was on the low end of average for weight gain, but nonetheless things were still acceptable. I continued to go to the meetings weekly. It was one of my only interactions with other adults and it was my lifeline. I made lots of friends there and, to this day, I think interacting with other moms is critical for this new life phase. It can be a very lonely time. Looking back, I'm almost positive that I would've gone completely crazy if I hadn't had some social interaction.

Even though I really enjoyed going, each week I was slightly disappointed with his weight gain. I tried everything the nurse and the other moms told me (cookies with milk boosting ingredients, green gatorade, herbs, pumping, extra feedings, etc.). For a long time I "triple fed," which means nurse, bottle of pumped milk, and pump. That could take 45 min+...times that by 8 feedings a day and it really adds up. Attending the group helped keep me going, but each week I felt stressed and disappointed. Others (not the other moms from the group or the nurse) tried to get me to add a bottle of formula, but I refused. Making milk is supposed to be simple: supply and demand. I knew that if I gave him formula my body wouldn't be getting the signal to make more milk. Looking back I wish I'd listened to Brandon and Mom about the formula, not because I thought I was wrong about my convictions, but mainly because it would have given me some sanity in an otherwise chaotic, trial and error lifestyle. Each week was a terrible cycle: I'd leave the meeting with a new plan and determination, all week I would try different things hoping that he would gain, but end up blinking the tears back as I looked at the scale each week. I felt like such a failure. My body was not doing what it was meant to do. I think the reason I kept it up so long is because I thought if I tried hard enough the next week, everything would be okay.

I was desperate for John Mark to be one of those EBF babies (exclusively breast fed). On all the mommy blogs I've read, they use this term and I feel like these mommies wear the term EBF as a badge of honor. Yes, the deserve it because breast feeding is hard and selfless. My determination to be "EBF" was killing me though.

Strangers would look at John Mark in his carseat and ask me how old he was. When they heard the answer, they'd say, "Ooooh, he's so tiny!" or "Was he premature?" In the beginning, I wasn't really offended by this because I knew that breastfed babies are typically smaller. It wasn't until my pediatrician noticed his thin arms that I got really worried. Around 3 months, I had to amp up my efforts even more. I was starting to lose it. I shed many tears at the meetings. Finally (after 4 long months) the nurse suggested that I just pump/bottle instead of nurse/pump/bottle (since he clearly was not doing a good job on his own). Basically I would be doing "double" feeding instead of "triple feeding." I was energized by the new plan. I thought, "I can do this!" Hmmmm....

Someone told me that if I was going to EP (exclusively pump...you have no idea how many baby related abbreviations there are in the breastfeeding world), I needed to go on a pumping spree...every two hours (including some at night)! Those were by far the craziest weeks of my breastfeeding experience. I even pumped in the car....while driving (with a cover of course).  This was the beginning of the end for me. I'm not even going to go into the details, but EPing is not an easy decision and is the most time consuming, annoying thing I've ever done. I swore that when it was over I was going to burn my pump (free thanks to the Affordable Care Act), but instead I donated it to a family in need.

It didn't take long for me to tire of the pump and we started supplementing some. Formula is a slippery slope and once I'd agreed to start supplementing, I got a taste of what it was like to be a parent. My life before BF was really and truly all about feeding my LO. Once I stopped, I had the time and the free space in my brain to enjoy my DS. I like to say that for the first 4-5 months of his life I was a milk maker only, but afterwards I finally got to be a parent. It was a loooong road and I'm glad I did it, but I've given up the guilt that comes with not being able to go the long haul. All I can say is that it wasn't for lack of trying.

I can't wait until our second (no time soon), so that I can have a do-over. Every baby is different, even when it comes to nursing. Although sometimes I joke that the next baby will get only formula and we'll do our own test to see whose IQ is higher, I'm definitely going to give it another shot.

I have debated a long time about whether to publish this blog because it seems a little depressing and hopeless and with as many new mommy friends as I know, I don't want to be discouraging. I really think it was worth the try and, had I had more milk, it's something I definitely wanted to continue. Everyone has different experiences and just because it didn't work for me (long term), doesn't mean it won't for others. I just think my story is worth telling because, for a long time, it seemed like I was only around people who were, for the majority, successfully nursing. On one of my darker days I googled "why not formula" and I found some very reassuring information and read one blog about how when the mother's happiness and sanity are in peril, then it's okay to think about formula. I just had such a hard time giving myself permission to throw in the towel.

I really wish this blog were more eloquent, but I guess the bottom line is that motherhood is difficult and filled with confusion, worry, and disappointment. Luckily, there are tons of other emotions that help overshadow the difficult times!

Sleep.

I was going to talk about sleep in my last blog, but then I realized I probably had enough material to write a whole blog. One thing that used to drive me crazy when I was pregnant, was when people (strangers and friends) would tell me, "Sleep now while you can!" That annoyed me for two reasons. One is that when you're 32 weeks+ pregnant and you're getting up every hour to go to the bathroom and you can't get comfortable with that huge bump on your belly, the last thing you want to hear is that you should use the time before the baby comes to get sleep. It sounds impossible! Two is that, for me anyway, ignorance is bliss, and I used to think "sure all those other babies get up all hours of the night, but I'm extremely positive and surely I can positive think my way to a baby who sleeps through the night!" Well, now that the tables are turned all I want to tell pregnant people is to SLEEP NOW! Seriously, even though I sound obnoxious, sleep now you preggos!

This sounds a bit dramatic when really John Mark is not as bad as other babies I've heard about. In the beginning, somehow waking several times a night was a little easier (probably because I could nap during the day and because you kind of sleep with one eye open when they first get home). By 7 weeks, he was only waking up once to nurse. Once per night was like bliss. And he was pretty predictable, which was lovely. I can't remember when he started sleeping through the night, but I think it might have been around 3 months. That was even better. However, it only lasted a few nights because my supply dropped off and I had to wake up to pump even though he was still sleeping. I got about 3 nights of 8 hour sleep (before I realized it was negatively affecting my milk) and it was awesome. Around four and a half months we had to give up nursing due to his slow weight gain, frazzled mother, and the impending end of my maternity leave (tearful decision, but I'm trying not to be too hard on myself). So around then I was free to sleep through the night again. I am grateful for a good month's sleep. Here he is from that time period. Things were good!

Who knew that this little sleep sack (a.k.a. swaddle/baby straight jacket) would be so important? When I'd first received it as a gift, I dutifully washed it in baby detergent like I did all his other laundry (which I no longer see as a necessity) even though I really didn't know what it's purpose was or how handy it would become. Like I said, things were good around this time!

And then it happened. I'd heard of it, but (again ignorance is bliss) I told myself it would never happen to my baby. Wrong. It happened. The four month sleep regression. Well, for us it happened at five months, but they call it the four month sleep regression. It was awful. Not only were we completely spoiled by then, but I was going back to work the week after this hit. I tried to tell myself that it was a one night fluke, but it lasted from the last week in July until about a week ago. He would wake up multiple times of night screaming. In the beginning he was hard to put back to sleep and it took lots of rocking and shhhhing (side note: while shhhhhing is intended to get people quiet, it's actually a pretty loud sound especially if you want it to be effective). He eventually got a little better and then it became an issue of the paci. We went back and forth upstairs to put the paci back and say a quick prayer that the paci was all he needed. For a time we thought this was teething or an earache or reflux, but a trip to the doctor told us it was none of those - just a growth spurt/sleep regression. Here I am cuddling him on one of his first miserable nights when we thought he was teething.

 

We tried different methods to deal with this new pattern. For a while we took turns sleeping in the guest room next to him so that each of us had a night "off" every other night. When things got a little better, we went back to sleeping in our room again and traded off nights for who was in charge of the monitor and putting the paci back. Sometimes we went upstairs 5+ times per night. We really didn't want to bring him back to our bedroom since moving him upstairs (after 4.5 months of being in a pack n play beside our bed) was such an accomplishment. Also, he's been swaddled to sleep pretty much since he was born, so we tried not swaddling, we tried a new swaddle, we tried one arm in, both arms in, both arms out... Here I am cuddling with him in the guest room one really bad night. Even though I felt frustrated and sleepy, how could my heart not melt looking at this!?

After trying a variety of arm positioning and a new sleep sack (this one was light and stretchy unlike his original fleece one that was becoming increasingly small), he was still waking up several times per night. Well, in a moment of frustration, on a particularly bad night when I was really tired, I took him out of his new, appropriately sized swaddle sack and put him back in his old tiny one with both arms in as tight as I could (if you weren't the mother of an infant you might think this was child abuse, but don't knock it til you try it) aaaaaaaannnnnddddd....he slept throught the night again after several nights of not sleeping through the night!!!!!!!!!!!! So of course, the next night we did it again and much to our delight it worked again. There was the problem of the too small sleep sack though. You know how in China the ladies wrap their feet really tightly to keep them from getting bigger? Well I had this fear that if we kept putting him in this incredibly small sleep sack, we would stunt his leg growth. Brandon headed back to the store and chose another sack that was bigger, but more like the fabric from the original sleep sack. We put him in it and hoped it would work and luckily it did. Man, is this kid picky!!!!

The photo on the left shows him in sleep sack #2. This is the one he hated (well we didn't know he hated it until we went back to the original). Here he is one night later in tiny sleep sack #1. Instead of getting his shoes bronzed, maybe we should have his beloved first sleep sack bronzed. 

Here he is napping soundly in his new sleep sack. I feel like Goldilox and the 3 Sleep Sacks. Finally, one works (and fits)!

This blog has been long enough, but just know that the sleep sack is not the only magic that contributes to our night of sleep. We have our very expensive sound machine (also known as my iPad), a humidifier (not sure if this helps, but the sound makes a nice environment), our AngelCare Movement Monitor (monitors movement, so if he stops breathing an alarm will sound), a paci, and a lovie (that has been in my laundry basket so it smells like me), gripe water (good distraction during screaming fits), and our video monitor. Each piece is integral. Who would have thought sleep would be this complicated and require so much equipment!?

This one below was from one night when we tried arms out. No Go. Also, it's back when we used a mobile. Those are good for about 5 months, but not much longer because after that they just want to grab them and play with them instead of sleep.

Every parent will tell you that life changes when you have a baby. Sleep is probably the most difficult change. I'd like to say that you get used to it (and I guess in some ways you expect it, but it doesn't make functioning on less any easier). However, all the great changes definitely outnumber the difficult ones. Even though there are some nights when I can't wait for him to fall asleep (so I can follow right behind him), I definitely miss him by morning time. Putting my feet on the floor when I hear him stirring is by far the hardest part, but once I start to climb the stairs I remember what I'm going to see when I get to the top. He'll be laying in his crib sometimes wimpering, sometimes cooing, and sometimes screaming, but no matter what, as soon as he sees me he smiles (even if it is through tears). Here he is yesterday morning (he wriggled his arms free while waiting on me):

Keeping Up with John Mark

Have you seen those new "Google Glasses?" They're like a smart phone you wear as eye wear. I saw them preview them on the Today show and even though the concept is really over the top, there was  one feature that was really appealing to me: whenever you want to take a picture of what you're looking at, you say, "Google Glasses, take picture." Sometimes when I'm looking at John Mark and he's making the most adorable face, I wish I had those glasses on! Google Glasses, take picture! With a six month old, it's a little harder to capture as many photos because I feel like he's so busy that we're always moving and not only can I not always get to my camera, but he's moving so much it's hard to get him to take a good picture and be still a minute. Luckily, we had some six month photos taken to capture these faces that I can't seem to get on my own camera. She did an amazing job! I'd like to think that he's just universally adorable, but I realize that I may be a little biased because I'm his mommy :)

People tell me all the time how much he looks like me. Here are some photos of me as a baby. You can judge for yourself:

 Here are some of Brandon:

He's been working on sitting up on his own for a while now, but still doesn't quite have it.  Now he's added trying to crawl to the mix. He has just recently started to lift his knees. I think he's really close and I wouldn't be surprised if he nailed it sometime soon. I guess mom and dad need to get to baby proofing this weekend! Here's a video of his first attempts:

In other news, we just got back from John Mark's first trip to the beach. It's our first real vacation since Mexico. My friend Jan said I needed to be more careful about the souvenirs I brought back this time, haha! Anyway, we had a great time seeing Mimi and Nana. Being at the beach as a parent is slightly different from going in your single days (for me "single" now refers to life pre-marriage and pre-baby, not necessarily pre-relationship...it just implies "unencumbered"). We did have a lot of stuff to haul (LOVE the new Go-Pod we got...it's like a baby bag exersaucer). He did good on the beach (better than me, I guess....I felt like I was always covered in sand and baby) and he liked floating in the ocean until the waves got to be too much to handle. Here are some pictures from the trip: